It's not like promotional videos are made to highlight everything that's good about what they're trying to sell, and downplay anything that isn't perfectly magical.
There are already video's on youtube of actual people trying it out, get ready for a flood of these videos to hit the blogs.
Many Apple products and technologies were acquired: Rosetta, iTunes, Final Cut Pro, Garageband, hell even OS X itself. The magic is in how they transform the software to make it Apple-like and fold it so completely into their ecosystem that it seems a natural fit. Not a lot of companies in the industry are able to get such milage out of their acquisitions.
All good points, certainly about software quality.
Just one thing about Android:
With Android, Google have a nice platform to push ads via ad supported apps (which I'm guessing all use a standard advertising API, though I haven't looked into it), and their built-in browser doesn't support extensions, so no ad block. I've tried other browsers, but even Dolphin HD just doesn't have as nice of an interface as the built-in browser
Sure they sell ads through Android, but $50,000,000 (original acquisition cost) + development costs + $12,500,000,000 (Motorola Mobility patents) = a lot of ads to sell to actually make a profit. Meanwhile Amazon is taking Android and cutting out Google entirely with their Kindle Fire.
Those billions mean nothing if they can't turn them into opportunities. If they can't they could join the ranks of fading tech giants like Microsoft (another one of those companies with billions in the bank) prematurely.
They don't have any idea how to create a successful business
Does Google ? That's sort of the crux of the rant, that they can't build successful platforms and use those to expand their business into new areas. Google in some ways bears a resemblance to the Microsoft of the late 90's: one cash cow and a lot of money pits they throw money in to avoid competitors gaining a foothold anywhere where it can threaten their core business. What are Google making from products like Google+ and Android except the benefit of using them as a hedge against Facebook and Apple moving in on their business ? To me those look a lot like what MS did with the Xbox as a hedge against Playstation (and consoles in general) and products like Internet Explorer, created to prevent Netscape from becoming dominant. Ultimately this has been a losing strategy for Microsoft, which has stagnated, and for its stockholders because the stock has been flat. So I think Google stockholders might rightfully be worried about reports like the rant posted.
You're referring to this report from way back in june. Neither Apple nor MS has confirmed it and iCloud was barely in beta at the time so it's hardly a solid fact. Maybe we'll get some more solid information on how it works now it has actually been released.
"Official Android player for Music Beta by Google." "Available in the U.S. by invitation only and free for a limited time. Request an invitation at music.google.com."
So it's out there but that doesn't seem like a "full" release to me.
I don't remember anyone paying attention to Apple 10 years ago. If anything it was dismissed out of hand. Only since Apple became a mainstream success has the vitriol flowed so freely. It hints at deep-seated geek insecurities in my opinion. There's a lot of lip service to computing for the masses but only if it means converting those masses to the "geek way", anything but that is met with extreme hostility.
Even if all that comes from google+ is facebook being a little less annoying to use, I think there are people at Google who consider it worth the investment.
Ummmm... no it isn't. Although there are 20 Just Bieber stories for every story I want to read about, the fact is that i have a choice. A patronage model is quite different from what we have today.
What we have now is a model where a handful of big music companies are the "patrons." The Biebers of the world are hand picked, groomed and styled to fit whatever they're pushing this year. Of course manufactured music isn't new, it goes all the way back to Tinpan Alley, but we've pretty much perfected it. The dumping of that stuff on the market by the companies that control most of the retail space, airtime, etc certainly does kill choice.
Patronage was cultural tyranny in which those with money controlled what was produced and made sure that it was to their tastes rather than the creator's vision and that the political implications lined up with their (ruling class) interests.
Pop culture is tyranny too, one in which the lowest common denominator determines what crud is dumped onto the masses. Every system has its downside.
Tiered pricing. Sell the digital copy for $ 0.99 a pop, paperbacks for $5, hardbacks for $20, signed editions for $50, etc. That way you can get the book out there to the masses for a reasonable price and allow your biggest fans to show their appreciation by buying something more permanent. Not coincidentally, this is also how Kickstarter works and what a lot of webcomic artists do.
They could, if they worked at it. Writers and other artists have to start working at creating a more personal relationship with their audience again. This is what the internet excels at: blog, tweet, create video's, provide your readers with a place to discuss your work and chime in once in a while. Neil Gaiman seems like one of the few authors who get this, Doctorow is another. When people recognize you as a real human being, one with whom their share a bond through your creations, they will be willing to pay.
I know of several very large sections of my music catalog that I would not have ever gotten into if someone hadn't given me a cassette recording or a ripped CD of their work. And yes I paid for those things. Some of them 2 and 3 times now as the formats have continued.
Me too . But if songs had been $0.99 wouldn't you just have have downloaded them instead having a friend tape it ? I'm not saying home taping destroyed the music industry, just that music became easier to distribute (and to take with you on your Walkman) but the music industry kept priced artificially high which actually impeded sales. What should have happened is that prices should have gone down to keep this expanding market buying legally in the first place instead of turning to the grey market for music discovery but that's not what they did.
"Now there there, Mr. Music Industry, yes you've been horribly ass-raped by the pirates. Just give us a big discount on your material, and we'll sell it legit."
I think music (and movies) had already been devalued (by market saturation, cassette taping, CDR's and the internet successively) and Apple just came along with a pricing model that was based in reality instead of wishful thinking. You can't fight "supply and demand" and win.
then you are a foreigner using my frame of reference.
So I'm not allowed an opinion because I'm a foreigner ? Maybe you'd like to point out where I was wrong instead of continuing with these ad hominem arguments ? Was the information I linked to incorrect ?
I don't get it. Were you responding to someone else?
No, I was responding to your "criticism" that I am like an american thinking he knows something about England after watching Benny Hill. It's a silly, and insulting, assumption on your part that because I reference one TV show that that comprises the whole of basis of my knowledge about your country.
How often have you seen an IT representative in front of the cameras say, "Well, we see this behaviour, the lights are flashing, the klaxons are going like a cat with its tail in a wringer, but the people who collect 7 figure salaries haven't been taking an interest so far."
I'd love to see someone do that, they'd never work in the industry again though.
Should be criminal charges for management negligence -- and I don't mean just giving the the sack. Those protesters on Wall Street have a point, everyone gets hurt when the bank CEOs screw up, but those most responsible. Thanks to their stalwart defenders in the US Congress no stronger regulation get passed. If that's not sign that government is in the bank's pockets, I can't imagine what could be more clear.
Thanks to the revolving door between Goldman Sachs and the US government the banks are the government. The barbarians aren't at the gate, they're manning the walls.
iTunes didn't bust up their distribution model the internet did, Apple was just there to seize on the disruption and capitalize on it with iTunes. The movie companies have already lost control of distribution, their movies are out there for download before they're even officially released. That genie isn't going back into its bottle. Of course they could keep reaching for that holy grail and drag their whole industry down the ravine by doing so.
"Let's face out out on the terrain no-one is holding these guys accountable. IT may set up the system, Risk Management may generate the reports and they'll be either modified to say what management wants to say or just plain ignored because like all gamblers these guys think they have a system which lets them keep on winning even as they are betting their house (or in this case our houses.)"
This "blame IT" crap has gone on long enough. It's time we stood up for ourselves instead of allowing ourselves to be used as a convenient scapegoat all the time.
Re:What he took away is more precious than given
on
Steve Jobs Dead At 56
·
· Score: 1
Agreed. The wilderness can be nice but sometimes you just want to sit in your garden and not have to worry about being mauled by bears or getting malaria.
Re:What he took away is more precious than given
on
Steve Jobs Dead At 56
·
· Score: 1
iOS has been losing marketshare since they are no longer the only game in town ?! Tell us more, captain obvious.
iDevices with cut-down OSes optimised for being dumb terminals to the Cloud, and centralised oligopoly providers of rentable computing: Amazon, Google and Facebook.
iDevices are anything but dumb terminals. Google is the one that's trying to move everything into the cloud, Apple's the opposite putting devices in your pocket that sync from the cloud to your devices (the cloud as syncing mechanism) with a strong focus on local applications.
he didn't necessarily aim to make the production of computing content, rather than its consumption, open and democratic.
Is that why every mac ships with a free development environment, a music creation application and a video editing application ? Oh and iMovie and Garageband are also available on iOS.
No dissin' Woz, but what, exactly, did he do after Apple?
He made a universal remote none has ever heard of, sponsored a failed music festival, then gave up and went dancing. Woz is a nice guy, a genius even, but he's not exactly savvy.
Slashdot Mirror
It's not like promotional videos are made to highlight everything that's good about what they're trying to sell, and downplay anything that isn't perfectly magical.
There are already video's on youtube of actual people trying it out, get ready for a flood of these videos to hit the blogs.
Many Apple products and technologies were acquired: Rosetta, iTunes, Final Cut Pro, Garageband, hell even OS X itself. The magic is in how they transform the software to make it Apple-like and fold it so completely into their ecosystem that it seems a natural fit. Not a lot of companies in the industry are able to get such milage out of their acquisitions.
All good points, certainly about software quality.
Just one thing about Android :
With Android, Google have a nice platform to push ads via ad supported apps (which I'm guessing all use a standard advertising API, though I haven't looked into it), and their built-in browser doesn't support extensions, so no ad block. I've tried other browsers, but even Dolphin HD just doesn't have as nice of an interface as the built-in browser
Sure they sell ads through Android, but $50,000,000 (original acquisition cost) + development costs + $12,500,000,000 (Motorola Mobility patents) = a lot of ads to sell to actually make a profit. Meanwhile Amazon is taking Android and cutting out Google entirely with their Kindle Fire.
Those billions mean nothing if they can't turn them into opportunities. If they can't they could join the ranks of fading tech giants like Microsoft (another one of those companies with billions in the bank) prematurely.
They don't have any idea how to create a successful business
Does Google ? That's sort of the crux of the rant, that they can't build successful platforms and use those to expand their business into new areas. Google in some ways bears a resemblance to the Microsoft of the late 90's: one cash cow and a lot of money pits they throw money in to avoid competitors gaining a foothold anywhere where it can threaten their core business. What are Google making from products like Google+ and Android except the benefit of using them as a hedge against Facebook and Apple moving in on their business ? To me those look a lot like what MS did with the Xbox as a hedge against Playstation (and consoles in general) and products like Internet Explorer, created to prevent Netscape from becoming dominant. Ultimately this has been a losing strategy for Microsoft, which has stagnated, and for its stockholders because the stock has been flat. So I think Google stockholders might rightfully be worried about reports like the rant posted.
You're referring to this report from way back in june. Neither Apple nor MS has confirmed it and iCloud was barely in beta at the time so it's hardly a solid fact. Maybe we'll get some more solid information on how it works now it has actually been released.
"Official Android player for Music Beta by Google."
"Available in the U.S. by invitation only and free for a limited time.
Request an invitation at music.google.com."
So it's out there but that doesn't seem like a "full" release to me.
I don't remember anyone paying attention to Apple 10 years ago. If anything it was dismissed out of hand. Only since Apple became a mainstream success has the vitriol flowed so freely. It hints at deep-seated geek insecurities in my opinion. There's a lot of lip service to computing for the masses but only if it means converting those masses to the "geek way", anything but that is met with extreme hostility.
Even if all that comes from google+ is facebook being a little less annoying to use, I think there are people at Google who consider it worth the investment.
Not Google stockholders I'm guessing.
Ummmm... no it isn't. Although there are 20 Just Bieber stories for every story I want to read about, the fact is that i have a choice. A patronage model is quite different from what we have today.
What we have now is a model where a handful of big music companies are the "patrons." The Biebers of the world are hand picked, groomed and styled to fit whatever they're pushing this year. Of course manufactured music isn't new, it goes all the way back to Tinpan Alley, but we've pretty much perfected it. The dumping of that stuff on the market by the companies that control most of the retail space, airtime, etc certainly does kill choice.
Patronage was cultural tyranny in which those with money controlled what was produced and made sure that it was to their tastes rather than the creator's vision and that the political implications lined up with their (ruling class) interests.
Pop culture is tyranny too, one in which the lowest common denominator determines what crud is dumped onto the masses. Every system has its downside.
Tiered pricing. Sell the digital copy for $ 0.99 a pop, paperbacks for $5, hardbacks for $20, signed editions for $50, etc. That way you can get the book out there to the masses for a reasonable price and allow your biggest fans to show their appreciation by buying something more permanent. Not coincidentally, this is also how Kickstarter works and what a lot of webcomic artists do.
They could, if they worked at it. Writers and other artists have to start working at creating a more personal relationship with their audience again. This is what the internet excels at: blog, tweet, create video's, provide your readers with a place to discuss your work and chime in once in a while. Neil Gaiman seems like one of the few authors who get this, Doctorow is another. When people recognize you as a real human being, one with whom their share a bond through your creations, they will be willing to pay.
I know of several very large sections of my music catalog that I would not have ever gotten into if someone hadn't given me a cassette recording or a ripped CD of their work. And yes I paid for those things. Some of them 2 and 3 times now as the formats have continued.
Me too . But if songs had been $0.99 wouldn't you just have have downloaded them instead having a friend tape it ? I'm not saying home taping destroyed the music industry, just that music became easier to distribute (and to take with you on your Walkman) but the music industry kept priced artificially high which actually impeded sales. What should have happened is that prices should have gone down to keep this expanding market buying legally in the first place instead of turning to the grey market for music discovery but that's not what they did.
"Now there there, Mr. Music Industry, yes you've been horribly ass-raped by the pirates. Just give us a big discount on your material, and we'll sell it legit."
I think music (and movies) had already been devalued (by market saturation, cassette taping, CDR's and the internet successively) and Apple just came along with a pricing model that was based in reality instead of wishful thinking. You can't fight "supply and demand" and win.
Well, if you are not an America,
I'm an America, and so can you !
then you are a foreigner using my frame of reference.
So I'm not allowed an opinion because I'm a foreigner ? Maybe you'd like to point out where I was wrong instead of continuing with these ad hominem arguments ? Was the information I linked to incorrect ?
I don't get it. Were you responding to someone else?
No, I was responding to your "criticism" that I am like an american thinking he knows something about England after watching Benny Hill. It's a silly, and insulting, assumption on your part that because I reference one TV show that that comprises the whole of basis of my knowledge about your country.
After all, this is 2011 and what the bankers did was in 2008.
What bull. The financial crisis is ongoing, the dominoes are still falling.
How often have you seen an IT representative in front of the cameras say, "Well, we see this behaviour, the lights are flashing, the klaxons are going like a cat with its tail in a wringer, but the people who collect 7 figure salaries haven't been taking an interest so far."
I'd love to see someone do that, they'd never work in the industry again though.
Should be criminal charges for management negligence -- and I don't mean just giving the the sack. Those protesters on Wall Street have a point, everyone gets hurt when the bank CEOs screw up, but those most responsible. Thanks to their stalwart defenders in the US Congress no stronger regulation get passed. If that's not sign that government is in the bank's pockets, I can't imagine what could be more clear.
Thanks to the revolving door between Goldman Sachs and the US government the banks are the government. The barbarians aren't at the gate, they're manning the walls.
Sarbanes-Oxley is a US regulation. The trader was in London.
Banks in Europe certainly implemented SOX, they couldn't do business with the US if they hadn't, as well as the various Basel accords.
iTunes didn't bust up their distribution model the internet did, Apple was just there to seize on the disruption and capitalize on it with iTunes. The movie companies have already lost control of distribution, their movies are out there for download before they're even officially released. That genie isn't going back into its bottle. Of course they could keep reaching for that holy grail and drag their whole industry down the ravine by doing so.
From my comment on the original article :
"Let's face out out on the terrain no-one is holding these guys accountable. IT may set up the system, Risk Management may generate the reports and they'll be either modified to say what management wants to say or just plain ignored because like all gamblers these guys think they have a system which lets them keep on winning even as they are betting their house (or in this case our houses.)"
This "blame IT" crap has gone on long enough. It's time we stood up for ourselves instead of allowing ourselves to be used as a convenient scapegoat all the time.
Agreed. The wilderness can be nice but sometimes you just want to sit in your garden and not have to worry about being mauled by bears or getting malaria.
iOS has been losing marketshare since they are no longer the only game in town ?! Tell us more, captain obvious.
iDevices with cut-down OSes optimised for being dumb terminals to the Cloud, and centralised oligopoly providers of rentable computing: Amazon, Google and Facebook.
iDevices are anything but dumb terminals. Google is the one that's trying to move everything into the cloud, Apple's the opposite putting devices in your pocket that sync from the cloud to your devices (the cloud as syncing mechanism) with a strong focus on local applications.
he didn't necessarily aim to make the production of computing content, rather than its consumption, open and democratic.
Is that why every mac ships with a free development environment, a music creation application and a video editing application ? Oh and iMovie and Garageband are also available on iOS.
No dissin' Woz, but what, exactly, did he do after Apple?
He made a universal remote none has ever heard of, sponsored a failed music festival, then gave up and went dancing.
Woz is a nice guy, a genius even, but he's not exactly savvy.